I’m sitting at the airport with more muscle than you would find at Gold’s gym (are those even still around) on a friday night. Yes, it’s the end of Arnold weekend. Today, shadowing my client, took me inside the Arnold Classic for the first time in my life. Over 18,000 athletes compete in this the largest sports festival in the world. Crazy crowd today. I took away a ton of learning about the festival, my client, Arnold, our Mayor and Governor Kasich. I typically do not like these kinda events but found myself sucked into this one by one thing – the passion of the people.
It didn’t matter if I was into any of it (I didn’t know what most of it even was), the people in it were. As we went from one event to another the common theme was passion. The fencers, strongest men/women, youth event after youth event, table tennis to interpretive dance, it didn’t matter – the people there were into it. I mean really into it. The energy was unmistakable. As I spoke to participant after participant it was obvious few were getting paid the big bucks. Few. Yet, all of them were into it.
The seed of high performance starts here. You cannot become the best of the best without some form of pure passion energizing your effort. The world of work provides the proof positive. Study those around who consistenly perform at or near the top of their profession and you’ll see some kinda passion fueling “another rep” mentality. You cannot manufacture or fake this. You know it when you see it.
Want a better team? Hire for attitude. Train for skill. The attitude you hire for? The passionate one; the nice, politically correct, gets along well with others and seems to have the right resume/pedigree – not so much. Hire for passion, please. Thanks, Arnold and team, for showing me so much today. I’ll be back…
BUILT TO LEAD 